2.12.09 - More questions than answers
2Girls1Book met last night and, while we sipped (read: chugged) our coffees and lightly (read: loudly) mocked the strangers in the coffee shop, we debated life's great unanswerable questions.
On the subject of Job: we don't get it.
Okay, first of all, I maintain that Job is a book full o'whining (and who wants to read that).
Also, they say that his great feat was never cursing God. Well, I don't buy it. He bitches and moans and he questions and he mocks God. Just because he doesn't outright shake his fist toward Heaven and scream "Curse you, God!" he gets a book written about him? Now granted, we haven't finished the book yet. But so far, I (and I believe I speak for the entire book club with this) am unimpressed.
Manda brought this one up to me and blew my mind:
Stan and God are basically playing a game with this man's life. Stan is allowed to just straight up slaughter his family (just *poof* dead) and everyone is so focused on Job but HEY! What happened to the kids?? They were just pawns in this cruel game? So, are you telling me that when God created the kids, he knew that their lives' (?) purpose(s) would be to just die so that their father could be tested in this way? God knew that Stan would challenge him and turn Job into a three-ring circus? Also: Are you telling me that, because I don't know what my purpose is and what I mean to the lives of other people, at any moment I could just *poof* drop dead so that some other person can have a small revelation about their own mortality? Wow. I wonder which of these boneheads in my life will be the one who will do me in...
I dropped this bomb on Manda, and I'm interested to know what other people think on this, because so far it's blowing minds all over the place:
It's a common belief that when you get to Heaven you are reunited with your loved ones who have passed and you have everything that could possibly make you happy (like donuts but you never get fat, and the weather is always sunny with a delicious light breeze).
Yeah, well I don't buy that either.
I realize it's not feasible for anyone to presume they know what happens after we kick the bucket, but if I'm going to Heaven, I don't think the goal is to be reunited with Grandma Lil and Grandfather Fred and Lilybud (as much as I wish I could). I think, if I get in, the point is to be with God. I believe that the sight of Heaven and the presence of God is so powerful and so fulfilling, that we won't NEED or WANT to be reunited with anyone from Earth. We will no longer crave those worldly relationships. We will just be -- at peace, in Heaven. I know that's kind of a bummer to most people, and even a little to myself. Like I said, I'd love to see my grandparents again, but I just don't think it will feel like a bummer when (read: if) we get there.
Kenny added a layer to this theory: He thinks that maybe you start over; that you meet your old loved ones all over again...for the first time. Again....I just don't buy it.
On the subject of Job: we don't get it.
Okay, first of all, I maintain that Job is a book full o'whining (and who wants to read that).
Also, they say that his great feat was never cursing God. Well, I don't buy it. He bitches and moans and he questions and he mocks God. Just because he doesn't outright shake his fist toward Heaven and scream "Curse you, God!" he gets a book written about him? Now granted, we haven't finished the book yet. But so far, I (and I believe I speak for the entire book club with this) am unimpressed.
Manda brought this one up to me and blew my mind:
Stan and God are basically playing a game with this man's life. Stan is allowed to just straight up slaughter his family (just *poof* dead) and everyone is so focused on Job but HEY! What happened to the kids?? They were just pawns in this cruel game? So, are you telling me that when God created the kids, he knew that their lives' (?) purpose(s) would be to just die so that their father could be tested in this way? God knew that Stan would challenge him and turn Job into a three-ring circus? Also: Are you telling me that, because I don't know what my purpose is and what I mean to the lives of other people, at any moment I could just *poof* drop dead so that some other person can have a small revelation about their own mortality? Wow. I wonder which of these boneheads in my life will be the one who will do me in...
I dropped this bomb on Manda, and I'm interested to know what other people think on this, because so far it's blowing minds all over the place:
It's a common belief that when you get to Heaven you are reunited with your loved ones who have passed and you have everything that could possibly make you happy (like donuts but you never get fat, and the weather is always sunny with a delicious light breeze).
Yeah, well I don't buy that either.
I realize it's not feasible for anyone to presume they know what happens after we kick the bucket, but if I'm going to Heaven, I don't think the goal is to be reunited with Grandma Lil and Grandfather Fred and Lilybud (as much as I wish I could). I think, if I get in, the point is to be with God. I believe that the sight of Heaven and the presence of God is so powerful and so fulfilling, that we won't NEED or WANT to be reunited with anyone from Earth. We will no longer crave those worldly relationships. We will just be -- at peace, in Heaven. I know that's kind of a bummer to most people, and even a little to myself. Like I said, I'd love to see my grandparents again, but I just don't think it will feel like a bummer when (read: if) we get there.
Kenny added a layer to this theory: He thinks that maybe you start over; that you meet your old loved ones all over again...for the first time. Again....I just don't buy it.